From THE SHAMROCK SHORE

(Following the international success of his play, ‘Kings of the Kilburn High Road,’ THE SHAMROCK SHORE is the second in Jimmy Murphy’s projected trilogy of plays about the Irish emigrant experience in England. The scene is Manchester. The body of a young Irishman, a soldier in the British army who has been killed in ‘friendly fire’ in Afghanistan, has been brought back to England for burial.)

ROSIE That’s not all we brought over…Jack, give us up me bag there please.

JACK HANDS ROSIE THE BAG AND SHE TAKES OUT A SMALL PACKAGE FROM IT.

ROSIE Seeing as he’s being buried over here I thought-

EDDIE And why wouldn’t he? Wasn’t England his home?

ROSIE He was born in Cork.

EDDIE Loved Manchester, every stick and stone in it.

JACK He never forgot Ireland though. Never forgot where he was born.

EDDIE DOESN’T LOOK AT JACK WHEN HE SPEAKS.

EDDIE Just ‘cause you’re born on a farm, don’t make a man a pig.

JACK He may have been rared over here. But he was an Irishman, British soldier or not.